Cup of Tea
by Katia Dashwood
Summary: Hermione had a secret. That secret was that she harboured a burning, forbidden longing and desire for Draco Malfoy. DMHG


Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.

Hermione had a secret. That secret was that she harboured a burning, forbidden longing and desire for Draco Malfoy. Even as a spy for the Order, he was greatly disliked by her two best friends and also by Ginny. He was disliked by just about everyone in fact, a dislike that was mutual. Hermione; however, had found something in Draco to like. More than one thing, actually. She liked his dry, sarcastic sense of humour and the way he always had a clever retort for another person's unpleasant comment, among other things. It took her months to realise her feelings and she was initially horrified, before deciding that she could fancy him whether or not she wished to do so, not that such an emotion was wise or made any amount of sense.

'Granger!' he roared at her as she came into the kitchen at number twelve, Grimmauld Place. 'Where is everyone?!'

'Out,' she said. 'They'll be back soon, though. Have a cup of tea.'

Hermione had found that Draco was easier to get along with if she didn't give him the option of refusing civility or kindness. Nonetheless, he still didn't take well to either.

'Tea?' he asked incredulously. 'I have something important to tell the Order and you tell me to have a cup of tea?' he sneered.

'It could certainly improve your temper,' Hermione said. 'But if you don't want any, don't have any.'

Draco left the room, leaving her alone. He returned ten minutes later and poured himself out some tea.

'I thought you didn't want any,' she said, smirking as she curled her hands around her mug. The glare he gave her, from underneath the hair that had fallen in his eyes, only increased her amusement.

'I changed my mind,' he said, sitting down at the table. He lounged in his seat, swirling the contents of his cup to cool them. He and Hermione sat in silence until the rest of the Order gathered in the kitchen, finally availing Draco of the opportunity to spill his oh-so-important news.

After that, Draco would sporadically appear in the kitchen when everyone but Hermione was out of the house. They got into disputes more often than not, but would sometimes just sit companionably. It became sort of a pattern after a time.

'One would think I enjoyed your company by the fact I'm always sitting in the kitchen with you,' Draco mused one day. 'That is, if that person didn't know us at all.'

Hermione laughed. 'Yes,' she agreed.

'One _would_ think you liked being here,' she added, raising an eyebrow at her tea. _It's been making me wonder..._

He let out a disgruntled huff.

'Long day?' she inquired, looking across the table at him.

'Long and dull,' he replied.

'Being Draco Malfoy isn't as exciting as you make it out to be?'

'Not always,' he admitted. 'Sometimes I spend the weekends reading or staring into the fire... Don't tell anyone I said that.'

'That would involve admitting I had a normal conversation with you,' Hermione said, teasing him.

Draco smirked and leaned back in his chair. 'I wonder what they think we've been doing. The others, I mean, when they come in here.'

'They probably don't think about it at all,' she replied. 'They try to ignore you unless they come in direct contact with you.'

'When are they getting back today?' Draco asked abruptly.

'Oh!' Hermione exclaimed. 'Not for ages. I'm sorry, I meant to tell you. The meeting has been moved until after dinner... You're welcome to eat with us.'

He looked pensive.

'You wouldn't have to cook in that case,' she added, hoping he _would_ came to dinner.

'True,' he said, still considering it. Then he nodded. 'I'll come,' he said a moment later.

Hermione almost smiled.

'That way I won't have to stand around, bored, waiting for everyone to finish eating,' he reasoned unnecessarily.

'Quite right,' she agreed as he stood. He threw his cloak around his shoulders.

'What time?'

'Seven.'

'See you then,' he told her, and left the house.

'Does he _have_ to come?' Ron whined while they were setting the table.

'Yes, Ronald,' Hermione said sharply. 'Inviting him was only polite, after he had been waiting so long for you all to come back.'

'I think it was very sweet of you to do so,' Mrs. Weasley said warmly as she set a tureen of soup next to the rolls. 'Poor boy, living all alone in that dreary old house with only Severus for company. He needs a good meal to fill him up.'

Draco arrived promptly at seven, just as everyone was sitting down, and he took the end seat, beside Hermione. He didn't really talk much the entire meal, except for, 'Thank you,' and 'Please pass the rolls,' but Hermione hadn't expected him to make conversation.

'This is good pie,' Draco commented during pudding.

'Thanks,' Hermione said. 'I made it.'

'Should I be afraid it was poisoned then?' he asked, eyeing his mostly eaten slice with much suspicion.

'If I were to poison you, I'd have slipped something into your tea earlier,' she said with a straight face.

This caused him to laugh quietly.

'You're sense of humour is quite twisted sometimes, Granger,' he said pleasantly. 'If I didn't know you, I'd have thought you were being serious just now.'

Hermione smiled back at him before Mrs. Weasley pushed back her chair and announced the start of the meeting.

As the meeting started to wind down, Lupin began a story of a chap he had met on the East Side of London. Draco touched Hermione's hand. 'I've got to go,' he whispered softly.

'I'll walk you out,' she replied and slipped out of the room with him.

'Thanks for inviting me to dinner,' he told her once they reached the front door. 'You're alright, Granger.'

'I hope that's meant as a compliment and not as a statement of mediocrity,' she said wryly.

Draco nodded and faced her instead of the door. 'I'm going to be going away on an assignment for a few weeks,' he said in a low voice, looking her straight in the eye. 'You know that already, though, since you all and Potter are going to attack the Dark Lord soon.'

Hermione nodded, but didn't say anything, half afraid she would betray her emotions if she spoke.

'In case I don't come back - I know she has never been nice to you - but will you make sure my mother is safe and all that?' he requested earnestly.

'I will,' she assured him calmly, though her hands were shaking. She was touched that he trusted her with that charge: she knew that he loved his mother very much indeed.

Draco paused, one hand on the doorknob. He opened his mouth as if to say something else, but closed it again and opened the door.

'Come back safe,' Hermione told him, and he was gone.

_Come back safe_, she mocked herself.

_Just like one of those silly girls in films about WWII. Is that who I'm becoming?_

_I certainly hope not._

A little under a month later, Harry killed Voldemort.

Hermione didn't see Draco at all during the fight, though she knew he must have been there somewhere. What Death Eaters who remained living were packed off to Azkaban Prison for life. The Order lost Aberforth Dumbledore and Hestia Jones from its well-known members. There were more casualties in the ranks of those who were new recruits, with whom Hermione was barely acquainted. A run-away Death Eater picked off Percy Weasley in the aftermath of the final battle. Coincidentally, the Death Eater was Dolohov, who had murdered the Prewetts in the First War. Dolohov met his fate at the end of Mrs. Weasley's wand. Tonks, Kingsley, and Neville ended up at St. Mungo's, but they were recovering. Hermione smiled to see Luna reading the Quibbler in a chair beside Neville's hospital bed while he slept. Lupin had to be given a sleeping draught because he had spent more than three days awake by Tonks' side, waiting for her eyes to open. He slept in a chintz armchair next to her now, instead of depriving himself of sleep.

It had been a week and a half since Voldemort had been defeated. Hermione, Harry, and Ron had joined their peers in NEWT testing the past few days.

The Ministry had started pursuing all three to join the Auror department straightaway and would let them skip training for they had already proved themselves. They were still deciding. After all, seven years of fighting had made them grow up too fast. For now, they would be taking some time off to relax.

Draco had not surfaced after the fighting was done. Snape was granted amnesty for his wrongdoings and was living with Narcissa, who had been surprisingly appreciative and polite about Hermione's actions to insure that neither the Ministry, nor any straggling Death Eaters, nor the press would bother her. Snape held that he had no knowledge of Draco's whereabouts, or whether or not Draco was even alive.

When Hermione arrived back at Grimmauld Place after visiting at St. Mungo's, she sat down at the kitchen table with a cup of tea and stared into the steam rising from her cup, brooding.

_I bet he's hiding himself away on purpose. Probably thinks this is funny._

She drained her tea in a gulp and placed her cup in the sink. As she turned around, she heard the front door open. Her eyes widened when she saw Draco burst into the kitchen. He strode over to her and encircled her in his arms. She held him tightly, breathing in his comforting scent and wondering if she was hallucinating.

Draco trailed a line of hot kisses up her throat and along her jaw line before urgently claiming her lips with his own. Hermione responded hungrily, parting her lips when his tongue begged entrance to her mouth. He backed into a chair and sunk into it, pulling her down with him. She threaded her fingers through his hair and he tangled the fingers of his free hand, the one that wasn't gently massaging her waist, in her bushy brown curls.

They broke apart, breathing heavily and he slid an arm around her as she sat in his lap, with her hand resting on his chest as it rose and fell.

'We thought you were dead,' she said accusingly. 'Search teams have been working to find you. They made us take our NEWTs first. I was going to leave with the others tonight.'

'I had to search the Manor,' he told her.

'They looked for you there.'

'Then, I had to chase my father for several days after finding him in a secret room at the Manor,' he continued. 'He has been handed over to the Ministry now.

'And they didn't arrest you on sight?'

He shook his head, tightening his arm around her. 'McGonagall vouched for me. I contacted her shortly before my arrival at the Ministry this morning. I knew, well, I _thought_ that maybe you would worry if I didn't send you a message, but it wouldn't have been safe for me to spare even a moment from my mission. And - I wasn't sure how you would react if I _did_ send you a note,' he told her. 'It turns out I needn't have been so cautious on that account,' he drawled, raising an eyebrow.

'How long have you felt this way?' Hermione asked curiously.

'Sometime after I joined the Order, in the fall,' replied Draco. 'You?'

'About the same.'

'I wish I'd just thought of kissing you sooner,' Draco said, smirking.

'We probably saved ourselves a lot of trouble with the war and all,' Hermione pardoned him airily.

'I don't know, I think it would have been the kind of trouble I would have enjoyed,' he said. 'Probably better this way though, as you say.'

'It will still be a tough ride.'

'As long as we're riding together,' he murmured in her ear, sending a delicious shiver down her spine. She leant her head on his shoulder and snuggled closer to him.

'Your mother!' she realised suddenly. 'You've got to go to her.'

'I daresay McGonagall went to speak with Snape the moment she left the Ministry. He'll let my mother know I'm all right. I can go see her later. I'd much rather stay here, where it's cosy.'

'What will you tell her, about us?' Hermione asked, pulling back to look at his face. 'I mean…'

'I will tell her the truth of course,' he said, 'that I came here first, had a lovely snog with you in the kitchen - ' he broke off, grinning mischievously when Hermione glared at him. He twirled one of her curls around his finger. 'I'll tell her I found a really great witch, who just happens to be one of my former enemies. She'll come around.'

Hermione smiled, softly kissing him.

'And what about you, eh? What will you tell Potter and the Weasleys?' Draco asked, cocking an eyebrow at her.

'Hermione, we don't need to go after Malfoy, he returned,' Ginny's voice called as she burst into the kitchen.

'Oh!' she exclaimed when she saw Hermione's present position. 'Well, I guess you know already.' She looked from Hermione to Draco and back again.

'This is an interesting new development,' she commented.

'Gin, what'd'you say we - ' Harry broke off his sentence as he entered the kitchen. Hermione and Draco got to their feet.

'I say, you lot are awfully quiet,' Ron said. He stopped in the doorway, looking from where Hermione stood, with Draco's hand possessively on the small of her back, to his astounded friend and not nearly so astonished sister.

'See you later tonight,' Draco told Hermione, kissing her softly of the lips before nodding to the others and leaving. Harry and Ron escaped awkwardly and a moment later.

'No dirty little secrets, eh?' Ginny said accusingly.

'Well, there's nothing tawdry about it, and it's hardly little at any rate,' Hermione defended. 'It's been rather a _large_ secret, I think.'

'Did he sweep you up in his arms and kiss you?' Ginny teased.

Hermione smoothed her robes. 'That's about it,' she said.

'He rushed in here to snog you senseless?'

'I wouldn't say "senseless" is the proper word. "Breathless," yes, but I am still very much in command of my senses.'

'He's good, then?' Ginny asked impishly.

'Yes,' Hermione replied, blushing.

'That was a major discussion topic in the girl's toilets and dormitories, whether he was or not,' Ginny told her. 'No one ever spoke of such thing in front of you, though.'

She raised an eyebrow. 'So, the Insufferable Know-it-All and the prince of Slytherin... Have fun facing Snape after this.'

Hermione tossed her head defiantly. 'He hasn't got a right to even _say_ anything.'

Ginny hugged her impulsively. 'I hope you and Malfoy will be very happy.'

I hope we will be, Ginny,' Hermione said, contented.

Not quite one year later, Hermione stood with Draco at the gate to a decent sized house on a quiet country lane. Her white dress just about glowed in the moonlight.

She inhaled the scent of fresh mint as they made their way up the walk and threaded her fingers through Draco's.

'I love you,' she said when they were in their kitchen.

'I love you too,' he said, smiling back at her.

'Have a cup of tea,' Hermione said innocently, though she ran a hand up his chest.

'Later,' Draco rumbled in her ear and he kissed her passionately.

FINIS


End file.
